How do you know if your website is optimized?  What tools can you use?  If you don’t already know the answer, then chances are there is room for improvement.  There are literally hundreds of ways to optimize a site.  For 5 quick SEO steps, you can start by reading an earlier post, but this is only surface level.

Now for even an easier way to check your site, try Website Grader.  This tool will give you a quick and simple assessment of your site.  The Website Grader will help you identify some of the algorithmic factors that search engines use to determine your sites placement.  After your site has been graded, you should have a very topical understanding of the work that needs to be done.

At Sober Intellect, we offer a wide variety of services that help your business achieve its objectives.  It doesn’t matter if your just beginning or if you have a well established site.  We can help position your site in front of your consumers, or we can use analytics to identify the highest converting consumer behaviors trending on your site.

Our design and consulting team has a vast array of experience and has been trained by the best in the industry.  Contact us today!

Looking for SEO Advice?  Ask your SEO questions

here.

• Do you have questions about ranking your website?
• Do you need an explanation of a particular strategy?
• Would you like to find out some easy tips and strategies to enhance your website?

Share you thoughts and ask advice from an SEO professional here.

Dale Petrich DDS – Tukwila Dentist Office

SEO Results for Dentist Office in near Southcenter area, WA

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5 Basic steps to improve your website

1. Update your page or META titles - Your page titles can be up to 65 Characters.  The page title is the title displayed in the search engine results. Each page should be optimized for a different set of keywords.  Duplicate page titles can divide page popularity.



2. Update your META Descriptions - This is the text below the title in Google’s Search Engine Results.  This field shoud be a short consice explanation of your services.  This section typically run our of space at 154 characters.
3. Use the “ALT” attribute for your images.  You can check this by right clicking on an image an selecting “properties”.  If the the “ALT” says “missing” Then you need to update this.
4. Use Heading attributes <H1> and <H2> -  This places an emphasis on important keywords and phrases on your pages.
5. Use block level analysis to determine optimal placement for your links.

Image compliments of SEOMOZ

The robots.txt file is a file that tells spiders and web robots what is acceptable to crawl.  When a site if first crawled, it first checks the domain (www. mywebsite.com/robots.txt) to see what is allowed and disallowed.

The robots.txt file looks something like this:

User-agent: *
Disallow: /

The “user-agent:” identifies the who and what is allowed.  In this case the “*” represents a wild card.  This means it applies to ALL robots.

The “Disallow:” identifies the location that is off limits to the spiders or web robots.  In this case, the “/” means the main directory.

The above statement basically tells the spiders to disallow all robots from crawling the main directory.

Another example of this would be:

User-agent: *
Disallow: /~ted/homework
Disallow: /images/2009

OR

User-agent: Adsbot-Google
Disallow: /financial-records

Now here is the kicker.  Just because you have requested that Google crawl certain information on your site, does that mean it wont show up in the search engines?  The answer is not necessarily.  If you tell Google not to crawl an images file, yet some of those images are linked somewhere else on the internet, Google can still make the association with the links.  Matt Cutts from Google does a nice job of explaining this.

The robots.txt file can be used to shape the content that you want the search engines to associate with your site.  Here is an example of how New York Times uses it.

Sober Intellect is a premier provider of internet marketing consulting services in Seattle.  Our thorough and in depth analysis of your online organizational structure will provide you will all of the information needed to make the best decision possible.  Our in depth analysis consists of a existing use of online marketing channels and aligning with current business objectives.

Our consulting involves use of competitive intelligence, existing campaigns, measurement tools, internal resources, and future initiatives and goals.

If you have question or would like to discuss your websites potential, contact us.

Internet Marketing Consulting by Sober Intellect

Kaibabydesigns transforms ultrasounds into beautiful and memorable art.

Search Engine Optimization for Kaibabydesigns.com

This is an example of how search engine optimization an online marketing strategies can help your business get to the top!

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Website Marketing Strategies

• Website Marketing Strategy

The strategy should really depend on your organizations objectives and your current positioning.  If you are just beginning to develop your online presence and website marketing strategy, you will be focusing on building and design.  If your website has been around for years and you are hoping to get better positioning before your competitors do, then you will be focusing on some of the fundamental elements of on and off page optimization.

• PPC Website-Marketing Strategy

Pay Per Click advertising is seen through many mediums across the internet.  One of the most commonly known campaigns is Google Adwords.  Yahoo has  a similar search marketing program and Microsoft has their version, AdCenter.  This is easiest way to get your organization to the top search results in many cases, but also one of the most expensive.  Depending on how competitive your industry is, you can spend anywhere from $100 a day to $5,000 a day.  Another benefit of using the PPC campaigns is that many websites incorporate these ads into their websites because they get paid for the clicks.  This helps drive more people to your site, but at a costly price.  If you engage in a PPC campaign BE CAREFUL.  Not knowing the proper way to optimize these campaigns can be extremely costly.

• Local Listings-Website Marketing

Local Listings are an integral part of any marketing mix.  If you have a physical location, it would be silly not to start here.  Sober Intellect has a partnership with the two largest distribution networks on the internet.  This means your business will propogate into sites like: Yellowpages, Bing, Google, Yahoo, Citysearch, Yellowbot, Urbanspoon, Superpages, Yelp, and many, many more.  This is an amazing opportunity for customers to leave feedback for your business and creates links to your website.  All of these can easily be managed and updated from one location on a monthly basis.  IF YOU ARE JUST GETTING STARTED, BEGIN YOUR WEBSITE MARKETING HERE!

• Site Architecture-Website Marketing

All of these elements are should be considered in your online marketing strategy.  Site architecture is important for several reasons.  First, when your website is being crawled by the search engines it, structure matters.  Second, utility for your consumers.  You want your site to be easily navigated and simple to customers to complete your funnel processes.  Your funnel process is the path you want your customer to take from entry to conversion.  For example, landing on your homepage and then filling out a contact form or making a purchase.  Its like if you build a house, you want people to be able to find the bathroom if necessary, right?  Maybe a bad analogy, but you get the point.

• Link Building-Website Marketing

Links to your site is probably one of the most important factors of achieving good organic results, especially in a competitive market.  This piece goes hand and hand with your search engine optimization strategy.  Sober Intellect offers SEO consulting services  and can help your organization get the results you are looking for.  Link building is often solicited in the form of directory listings. BE CAREFUL with this.  Google is well aware of the link directories that are associated with spammy sites, and will penalize your site if associated with these.  I have seen this happen so again, be very careful purchasing links!

SEO Consulting Services by Sober Intellect

The top organic search results are the top results delivered by search engines and deemed most relevant.  Getting organic search results is important because it is the best way to drive traffic to your site and the most cost effective.  An organic SEO consultant studies the competitive landscape and uses on and off page optimization in order to achieve the best organic results possible.  More tactics are often employed depending on the competitiveness of the pinnacle term attempted.

You can test your organic positioning by typing the keywords you want consumers to locate you with and see if your website is listed on the first few pages.  Of course, the goal is to be on the first page, but without an organic SEO consultant, it can be difficult to rank for multiple terms.  For example, an Italian restaurant may want to rank for the following terms:

• Italian Food
• Italian Restaurants
• Italian Take-out
• Italian Fine Dining

For the sake of argument, lets say our Italian restaurant ranks #2 on the first page of Google.  However, the other terms do not rank until the 5th or 6th pages.  The goal of an organic SEO consultant would be to help the Italian restaurant rank for these other terms as well.

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Local Search Drives More Traffic to your Website

Are you interested in finding out how you can leverage online local listings to drive more traffic into your business?  Making yourself available to your customers is the best way for them to find you.  Is your business listed in local search results?  Here are some reasons to use local listings

1. Drives business to your location
2. Reach more customers
3. Search results are geo-centric “Pac-10 results”
4. Provides more opportunities for your customers to leave positive feedback about your business
5. Increases brand recognition
6. Choose the keywords you want customers to associate with your business
7. Provides your customers more opportunities to find your business

Local Listings

Local Listing placements is important piece of an organizations marketing mix.  Many consumers use local maps and local directories to find information and locations of various retail and service locations.  If you don’t see yourself in places like Google Maps, Yahoo Maps, Citysearch, Yelp, Yellowpages, Superpages and many more, this is right for you.  If your organization is primarily web driven, then local listings will support your current marketing strategy.  Local Search is a very strong tool, and has the potential to drive a significant amount of traffic to your site.

If you want to find out how to get your business distributed throughout the Local Listing network, contact us.

Its easy and inexpensive!

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